


i can feel you (slipping through my hands)

by lostnthedream (falloutangel)



Series: a point where two worlds collide [2]
Category: Monsta X (Band)
Genre: Angst, Grief/Mourning, M/M, its all sad, no happy ending in sight im sorry
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-15
Updated: 2019-06-15
Packaged: 2020-05-12 05:20:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,962
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19222420
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/falloutangel/pseuds/lostnthedream
Summary: A phone call on a Tuesday afternoon changes everything and Kihyun’s future dissolves like ash before his eyes.(Prequel to i’ll meet you at the divide)





	i can feel you (slipping through my hands)

**Author's Note:**

> i just decided to post what i had for this on impulse, because i'd been running out of inspiration of this series. i hope you like it even tho it's mega sad hours. 
> 
> (it takes place in the alternate universe if you didn't catch that)

When Kihyun picked up his phone when Jooheon’s name lit up the screen, he didn’t think it would bring him here - rushing to a hospital with fiancé’s name on his lips, stuck standing in front of a doctor whose eyes are too sympathetic. Too apologetic.

 

_(“Hello?”_

 

_“Hyung, you need to get to the hospital now. It’s Hyungwon, he- he just collapsed and we don’t know what’s going on and-”)_

 

The words that leave her mouth don’t register fully. Because they weren’t the words that she was supposed to say. He was supposed to be fine. Jooheon was supposed to be overreacting. Hyungwon was supposed to be just fine and to come home from work at seven for dinner. Kihyun wasn’t supposed to be standing in a hospital. None of this was supposed to be happening.

 

_(“He suffered a severe heart attack, though we haven’t determined a true cause. We’re extremely sorry for your loss and we offer our condolences._

 

_“W-what do you mean unsuccessful?”_

 

_“We’re so sorry, but he was pronounced dead ten minutes ago.”)_

 

His feet walk out to the waiting room without him even realizing where he’s going or that he’s even doing it, head caught somewhere behind him.

 

Jooheon jumps up from his seat, startling him to the present. He bounces nervously in front of Kihyun and looks at him expectantly.

 

“Hyung, what did they say?” Jooheon asks, ringing his hands. “Is he okay?”

 

Kihyun stares at his friend, fist caught in his throat. His mind is blank. Everything is blank. He can’t feel his fingers and the room seems to be closing in on him.

 

“He-” Kihyun can’t bring himself to continue. It can’t be real. None of this is real.

 

Jooheon watches him, tilting his head. “Ki-hyung?”

 

Kihyun shakes his head, hands clenching. He can’t say it. He won’t. Jooheon stares back, watching Kihyun’s face, a dreadful knowing taking over his eyes.

 

“No,” Jooheon whispers, face crumbling. “No, no, he can’t be-”

 

Kihyun pulls him in before he can see the tears fall from Jooheon’s eyes, holding him close.  

 

Jooheon cries and Kihyun can’t even begin to understand how he’s not in Jooheon’s position. How he can hold the younger and quietly shush him while his world turns to ash around him. That’s how his insides feel. Frail and colorless, like the softest breeze could blow him away.

 

He stares ahead at the dull blue wall in front of him and slowly rubs up and down Jooheon’s back while the younger’s shoulders shake against his smaller body.

 

How are you supposed to act when your world suddenly gets taken away? He doesn’t know.

 

Kihyun doesn’t cry as Jooheon pulls away or when he drives him home. He walks straight into their room, not looking at any of the pictures on the walls or the clothes strewn on the floor. He doesn’t cry as he showers, barely feeling the scalding water on his skin. He doesn’t cry when he lies in bed, Hyungwon’s side of the bed empty and cold.

 

His eyes slide shut and he’s pulled into darkness, finding relief in the nothingness.

 

~~~

 

He wakes to the sound of his phone buzzing on the bedside table next to him. He lets it buzz, knowing that if he reaches over and unlocks his phone he’ll have to face the picture of his lockscreen of he and Hyungwon pressed against each other, smiling and happy. Alive.

 

He lets a heaviness settle over him again when the buzzing stops. A few seconds pass before it starts again and his eyes snap open. He grabs his phone, turning it off and stuffing his phone under his pillow and turning the other way, wrapping the covers tighter around himself.

 

It’s colder in the morning without Hyungwon’s long limbs wrapped around him in some way like an octopus. Kihyun is used to waking up with an arm slung around his waist or long legs tangling with his own. He’s not used to emptiness.

 

The room feels extra silent without Hyungwon’s soft snores scratching at Kihyun’s ears. He curses his body for not being able to sleep long, rising with the sun when all he wants to do is fall back into nothingness.

 

He snaps out of his thoughts, hearing pounding on the door. Insistent and loud. _Thud. Thud. Thud._

 

Sighing, he slips out from the covers, going to the front door.

 

“ _Kihyun, let me in_ ,” sounds a muffled voice from the other side. _Thud. Thud. Th-_

 

Kihyun opens it, and Hoseok stands there fist still raised, mid knock. He stares at him for a moment and Kihyun briefly wonders if he looks like someone who just lost everything.

 

Hoseok steps forward, engulfing Kihyun in his arms, holding him tight against his chest. “Minhyuk told me,” he says, voice choked, and for the first time since the hospital Kihyun feels his eyes prick with tears.

 

He wraps his arms around Hoseok and returns the embrace, taking in the comfort of his best friend. He buries himself in Hoseok’s broad chest, taking in his warmth, trying to feel something that isn’t numbing shock.

 

“You’re not alone, okay?” Hoseok says and Kihyun’s hands clench in the fabric of the larger man’s shirt.

 

He lets Hoseok hold him, scared that if Hoseok lets go that he’ll fall apart and won’t be able to put himself back together.

 

~~~

 

The picture they choose for the funeral is beautiful. Kihyun has no shortage of beautiful pictures of Hyungwon.

 

Kihyun had taken it on their trip to Japan. Hyungwon brought him along on one of his business trips to meet with some executives at a label. Hyungwon extended the trip by a few days, giving them a small vacation - their first vacation.

 

Hyungwon’s dark hair brushes past his eyebrows and his eyes are a little puffy, but they squint slightly and crinkle around the edges because of his smile. His ears curl out from his fluffy hair and the earrings that Kihyun brought him for his birthday dangle down.

 

Hyungwon smiles wide in the frame by the casket, eyes alive and sparkling, lips pulled back and grinning, showing his teeth.

 

Kihyun always thought that those smiles were his prettiest. Hyungwon had a habit of pressing his lips tight when he smiled, puffing out his cheeks and making his mouth a long thin line.

 

_Smile with your teeth!_

 

_You know how weird that request is right? What’s wrong with how I normally smile?_

 

_Just do it, Won._

 

Kihyun doesn’t want to look away from the picture. He wants to go back in time when he didn’t need pictures to see his smile.

 

Hyungwon’s face today isn’t anything like his picture.

 

Hyungwon’s family took care of most of the funeral decisions, but Kihyun looks down at him and he _hates_ it. His face is pale and paper-like, his hair is stiff and combed back, his lips aren’t smiling -- aren’t doing anything. His body is surrounded by lilies, laying there in a white suit and it makes everything is _too white_ , too white to look without being nearly blinded.

 

Kihyun probably stays too long by the casket, but his feet feel cemented into the ground and moving them takes too much concentration. He feels washed away, colorless, like his mind is floating through the procession.

 

He looks and it doesn’t feel like Hyungwon. None of this feels like Hyungwon. Hyungwon would never wear white if he could help it.

 

He feels a hand press against the small of his back and he finally tears his eyes away. Hoseok stands by him, looking down at Hyungwon for barely a second before he has to look away.

 

“Come on,” Hoseok softly ushers, the command unsticking Kihyun’s feet allowing him to leave the pale corpse behind.

 

He practically hides behind Hoseok’s larger frame for the rest of the viewing, polite words to guests leaving his mouth when they try to talk to him, but none of them are truly registering. All he wants to do is shrink until he’s invisible, until he’s so small that no one can see him. Not existing seems easier than whatever this is.

 

As the service begins, Kihyun tries to listen to what they say, but it all feels like background noise in his head. He absentmindedly twists at the ring on his finger, drifting back to the night Hyungwon asked him to marry him.

 

Candlelight. Hyungwon’s soft, low voice in his ears. A small black box that took Kihyun’s breath away.

 

Kihyun is scared of all the wedding magazines he’s collected in the past month and design plans that are scattered across the coffee table in their living room. He stayed with Hoseok for the week of organizing the funeral. He hasn’t been home since that first night. He’s not sure he wants to go back.

 

The tie around his neck suddenly feels too tight. Like it’s slowly getting closing more around his throat and suffocating him.

 

Hoseok stands up from his chair next to him, yanking Kihyun from his spiral. He gives Kihyun’s shoulder a comforting squeeze before walking up to the front, note cards in hand.

 

He looks handsome in his suit today, Kihyun thinks as Hoseok smiles politely at crowd. Kihyun admires him, wondering the strength it takes to be Hoseok on this day.

 

They had asked Kihyun if he wanted to give the eulogy and his mouth had gone dry at the thought. How could he tell a room of people that he just lost his soulmate? How can he describe that he was ready for forever with his man and how that forever just got viciously taken away from his grasp? He had ducked his head, politely declining and they hadn’t pushed him.

 

Hoseok on the other hand was made of words. And today, unlike no other, Hoseok’s words are beautiful. Hoseok was a poet in college and that part of him never died. His words map a mirror image of the man who smiles out at Kihyun from his framed portrait, not the one that lays in box next to him.

 

He tells them stories about how Hyungwon was alive and had this light inside of him that captivated everyone around him. Kihyun knew it well enough, how when he lit up Kihyun couldn’t look away.

 

Hoseok finishes and polite applause fills the room as he makes his way to his place next to Kihyun.

 

Hoseok, however strong and wonderful and solid, is also sensitive and very much grieving. Seconds after he sits down, he breaks, a soft sob from his mouth that he buries in his hands. Tears slipping from his eyes and Kihyun brings as arm over his muscled shoulders and pulls him in, taking his turn to shoulder the pain, letting Hoseok take shelter in his shoulder.

 

“You did so well,” he whispers, running his fingers through the hair on the back of Hoseok’s head. “He would be proud of you.”

 

Hoseok sniffs, gripping him a little tighter and Kihyun lets him. He pulls away seconds later, trying to compose himself and sat up, trying to stay strong. Kihyun reaches out and holds his hand. Hoseok squeezes back.

 

When it’s time to bury him a part of Kihyun dies, watching as ever so slowly as the dirt covers the dark coffin and completely takes Hyungwon away from him.

 

He stands stock still, numbingly watching the hole fill to the top and staring as the small group surrounding the grave slowly walk away. Was this supposed to make this all real to him? Was this supposed to make him finally understand that Hyungwon is gone? If it was then why does he feel like when he goes home he’s planning on Hyungwon coming home from work at seven? Why does he expect to turn around at any moment and expect to see his long, thin frame with a stupid smirk on his face, like this is just his new way to torment him and Kihyun fell for it like he always does?

 

He swallows, fists clenching under the long sleeves of his coat. The crowd is gone now and he feels a hand on his shoulder.

 

“Take me home?” he asks, voice choked and quiet. Hoseok nods, draping an arm around Kihyun’s shoulders protectively and now it’s his turn to bury himself in Hoseok’s neck.

 

The sound of dirt hitting the polished wood echoes in his mind and he clenches his eyes shut, fighting the sting of tears and tightening throat as Hoseok leads him away, leaving behind Hyungwon with his freshly engraved stone.

 

_Chae Hyungwon_

_1994-2018_

_He was beloved in life._

 

~~~

 

He says his goodbyes to Hoseok in the car, walking up the apartment by himself. He felt guilty about how much he’d relied on his friend this week, the exhaustion so clearly evident on Hoseok’s broad shoulders.

 

So evident that he didn’t even try to fight when Kihyun stopped him from getting out of the car and told him to go home and rest.

 

Walking into the empty apartment shouldn’t put such a heavy weight on his chest, but it does. He walks in and waits like something’s about to happen, but nothing does. It’s exactly as he left it, albut a little dusty and the plant on their table turning brown on the ends.

 

He swallows, setting down his things and gripping the back on the dining chair.

 

 _Home._ For the first time since he’s moved in, the word didn’t fit right as his eyes scanned over the small apartment.

 

Before he knows it his body has shut down and gone into autopilot cleaning mode, hands doing the work before he really even processes what he’s doing.

 

He starts in the kitchen getting rid of the small stack of dirty dishes by the side of the sink from the last night he and Hyungwon had dinner. He shoves them all in the dishwater and starts it, wiping down the counters and straightening all the shelves. He cleans out the fridge, throwing out old, wilting produce, some of Hyungwon’s leftover thai food, and dumping out his bottle flat orange soda.

 

When he walks by the door again he sees the shoes in the closet in disarray, Hyungwon’s doc martens kicked lazily beside the shoe rack. Kihyun grabs the rogue boots and arranges them neatly on the rack, the docs sitting at the top next to Kihyun’s worn pair of converse

 

He hangs up the jackets that are draped across the backs of the kitchen chairs. On the kitchen table is bag that the hospital gave him with Hyungwon’s belongings. He takes it and shoves in the top shelf of the closet, shutting the door. He’s not ready to look at that yet.

 

In the living room he quickly gathers all of the wedding magazines he stole from Minhyuk and pamphlets for venues on the table and dumps them in the recycling under the kitchen counter. He returns, folding the blankets, and he finds one of Hyungwon’s sweaters crushed in on of the couch crevices.

 

It’s the soft blue one that Kihyun always liked to steal on rainy days.

 

He hesitantly lifts it to his face, the soft fabric brushing his nose. It smells like their fabric softener, which means that Hyungwon hadn’t gotten a chance to wear it yet after the wash. It had probably gotten scrunched in the side of the couch on accident as Kihyun did laundry. It’s Hyungwon’s sweater, but it doesn’t smell like Hyungwon.

 

Setting it back on the couch he walks to the bedroom into the closet where the floor has several clothing items strewn on the floor.

 

He picks up Hyungwon’s wrinkled button up from the floor, lifting it to his face and smelling the faint cologne and spice that makes up Hyungwon’s smell.

 

Closing his eyes he can almost pretend that he’s right in front of him and he just got home from work. That he just walked into the apartment and Kihyun had just come over and pressed into his chest, tucking under his chin because this is how they fit together so perfectly. He’d breathe him in and he’d smell just like this. Then Hyungwon’s arms would come around and stroke down his back and Kihyun would feel a kiss on the top of his head and-

 

Kihyun opens his eyes.

 

He clenches the smooth fabric in his hands and suddenly feels it. The realization that Hyungwon isn’t walking through the front door ever again. He’s standing in the closet and Kihyun already started to erase his existence from the apartment.

 

He slowly falls to his knees, head falling into the shirt that’s clenched in his hands and a pathetic cry escapes his mouth, cracking open his chest and hunching him over.

 

He’d been strong this whole week - seven days since Hyungwon left and he didn’t cry, but now he can’t stop. Tears keep falling from his eyes and he falls apart in a dark closet, only he and Hyungwon’s clothes around to hear the sounds of his cries.

 

His sobs are loud, ugly and they _hurt_. He feels like they’re tearing him apart. The past week he’s been numbingly floating on the surface of a dark ocean and suddenly he’s being drug down, grief engulfing him, filling his mouth and lungs.

 

Hyungwon isn’t coming home. Hyungwon died and left Kihyun here alone. Kihyun had a plan. He had a future. Now he doesn’t know anything. He doesn’t even know how to stop the tears from falling down his face and soaking the shirt in his hands.

 

“How am I going to do this, Won?” he cries, slumping forward and burying his face in the shirt. “What am I going to do?”

 

He has no answer. He wonders if he ever will.

  


**Author's Note:**

> i'm sorry ;;;;
> 
> [twitter](https://twitter.com/lostnthedream) // [cc](https://curiouscat.me/lostnthedream)
> 
>  


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